Testing Various .223 Russian Ammo in my POF P-415

I am going to test four different types of two different manufacturers' .223 Russian ammo in my POF P-415 upper. I will test the following ammo:

Wolf 55 grain FMJ, Silver Bear

Silver Bear .223 62grn HP

Wolf Military Classic .223 55grn FMJ

Brown Bear .223 55grn FMJ

I plan on firing 40 rounds of each. Much like wine tasting, I want to make sure that my upper has a "clean pallet" for each flavor of ammo. I want to know what steps I can take between firing each type of ammo to insure a "fresh start", and be able to accurately note/judge each type of ammo. What I'm trying to see is which type of ammo will feed reliably in this POF upper. I had several stuck cases using Tula 62 grain HP.

Hi just thought I'd tell you that my daughter and I went thru over 3,000 rounds of brown bear at a carbine course at Blackwater last year without any fail to feed or other problems. I found wolf to be very dirty shooting. PS beautiful rifle!!

I've shot thousands upon thousands (probably close to a Million lifetime) of Russian manufacture ammo through many different firearms, granted 75% of it was 7.62x39mm out of AK-47s and NEVER had problems other that greater powder fouling than you get from some better made stuff.

I've shot Russian steel in all my pistols, rifles and (obviously not steel, but Russian) shotguns.

I buy American every chance I get, but when it comes to ammo, American manufacturers gotta compete. They do very well in other areas, but not military types.

I've shot thousands upon thousands (probably close to a Million lifetime) of Russian NEVER had problems
I've shot Russian steel in all my pistols, rifles and (obviously not steel, but Russian) shotguns.

I am going to test four different types of two different manufacturers' .223 Russian ammo in my POF P-415 upper. I will test the following ammo:

Wolf 55 grain FMJ, Silver Bear

Silver Bear .223 62grn HP

Wolf Military Classic .223 55grn FMJ

Brown Bear .223 55grn FMJ

I plan on firing 40 rounds? of each. Much like wine tasting, I want to make sure that my upper has a "clean pallet" for each flavor of ammo. I want to know what steps I can take between firing each type of ammo to insure a "fresh start", and be able to accurately note/judge each type of ammo. What I'm trying to see is which type of ammo will feed reliably in this POF upper. I had several stuck cases using Tula 62 grain HP.

Thanks!

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Right no, ArNoob

I think 100 rounds would leave you a clean palate as long as you ran a chamber brush and bore snake halfway through.

If there was some factor that caused failures, chances are that ot wouldn't show up right away.

Hi just thought I'd tell you that my daughter and I went thru over 3,000 rounds of brown bear at a carbine course at Blackwater last year without any fail to feed or other problems. I found wolf to be very dirty shooting. PS beautiful rifle!!

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Thanks. I'm glad it worked for you. I should have tried another mag on the second batch of ammo.

I am still waiting for the results video that was removed 2 days ago. The same day, same morning it was posted.
How about OP gives us a written rundown instead?

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Yeah, sorry about the delay.

Ok, so the results are in. Here are my findings:

** Silver Bear (62 gr.) ** - 40 rounds, zero failures of any kind.

** Brown Bear (55 gr. FMJ) ** - First 20 rounds, zero failures of any kind. Second magazine of 20 rounds, failure to extract and eject after EVERY ROUND! I used two different magazines, so the mag can't be ruled out completely.

I think that once you have run 400 rounds of one brand you'll have some idea of what works and what doesn't. Twenty or forty rounds is not enough to tell anything. Also depends on your make of mags, what upper, etc etc. I didn't notice, dd you thoroughly clean between each brand? I cannot im agin why brown bear would give extraction problems but none of the rest did. I have no real preference but like I said my daughter and I went through over 2500 rounds of brown bear in five days, only had time to clean the rifles on the evening of the third day so they were plenty dirty. Zero fail to feed or extract. We had taken along 2500 rounds of milsurp just in case.

Well after making a post that pretty much advocated the use of most steel cased ammo in ARs and other (mostly tighter tolerance firearms) I had a veryBAD experience with WOLF AMMO.

Before I start. . . The gun WAS DIRTY! It had about 250 rounds run through it before we got started and the malfunctions began about 75-100 rounds into our shoot, but still that's not enough in my book.

Basically what happened is once the BCG and chamber began to foul, the Wolf would not go into battery AT ALL! We (3 of us avid shooters and one long time loader) came to the conclusion that there was insufficient propellant to fully charge the carrier and therefore would not close the bolt with a round out of the mag. Many times the carrier was not cycled enough to even pick one up out of the mag at all. Other times it would strip a round, but not fully go into battery.

Once the ammo was switched to Winchester or ANY brass, the gun functioned flawlessly. I even sent Brown Bear that I had through the gun and had no issues. Since I have several hundred more rounds of Wolf on hand I will test again after a full cleaning and see how much it takes to get a failure.

That has been my experience too that wolf burns very dirty! Brown bear did not crud up my rifle and gave no malfunctions. As to the cause of the fail to feed, you might want to scrub out the gas tube. since it was cycling before with wolf it might be a buildup of powder residue in the gas tube and of course the chamber that was causing the problem.

Someone was asking about using steel Russian ammo. Many people are afraid to shoot it because they read comments like this--"a friend told me it was no good". Having never shot one single round, they have an opinion... Maybe this will help clear things up, this was my reply ~~~
Where are the Ammo Experts? Russian Steel Core? Not!
I’m not the expert but I do shoot a lot, and read anything I get my hands on.
The current batch of Russian ammunition on the market these days is very reliable. If you have a clean weapon that does not have issues, and a good quality magazine, you will not have the problems you read about on these sites. I have gone through thousands of rounds of different NEW Russian ammunition (Tulammo-Silver Bear-Ulyanovsk)(Small amount of Wolf) (No Brown Bear) and have only had two or three misfires, all of which were because I tried to put one too many rounds in my magazine… so this was a feed problem, not a misfire.
This being said, I do see one negative, the cheap Russian ammo does shoot a little dirtier than the Domestic ammunition. If you shoot a box or less, this is not a problem. If you go to the range (or the woods) and shoot hundreds of rounds as I do, you will notice a light black carbon, burnt powder buildup. However, it is easy to clean up, which you should do anyway if you would like your weapon to work properly. I’ll say it again… CLEAN YOUR WEAPON!
One more thing. Steel core ammo is illegal where I live… I’m not 100% on this to be true in every State. The Russian ammo DOES NOT have a steel core. It is comprised of the following (BULLET) is (LEAD CORE – LIGHT STEEL SLEEVE – AND A .003 THICK COPPER JACKET). (THE CASING) is (STEEL WITH SOME TYPE OF PLATING OR COATING) to protect it from corrosion and or rust. Again, this ammo is lead core not steel! Your friends at the range make a large percentage of their profits from selling your REAL BRASS CASSINGS. They cannot sell or reload your steel casings. This is the major reason they outlaw the use of it at their range ~ Hope this helps. There is a great article on ammunition storage on the “Draco Pistol Fans” Face-Book page. Hope this helps.